He walked along by the Booking Office pub. Quarter to eight by the big clock at the top of the Balmoral. But it was three minutes fast. It always was. Dad had told him that. They set it like that on purpose to make people hurry for the trains. They’d done it in Victorian times. He remembered that Dad was waiting for him, and quickened his step. Princes Street was already quite busy with weekend visitors. A tram purred along beside him. James had told Dad about the trams on one of his trips to the bridge. It’s gone a long way over budget, he’d said. But you would have liked it. You do like it.

His stomach swirled with qualms as he passed the clock and the Scotsman building came into view. We expected this, this was going to be tricky, he said to himself again. His heart was frisking about; there was that prickling and fizzing again in his arms and legs.

James rested his hands, wide apart, on the pale blue paintwork. All that separated him from the fall was the ledge, just wide enough to stand on, and not high at all. He could easily get up onto it with ten seconds’ effort. With the traffic going by, and the Saturday bustle of pedestrians, it didn’t feel like a bridge at all; it was easy to forget how high you were, how close you were to falling through the air, if that was what you chose. Everything was as James had seen it, so many times. The tall, stern tenements. The castle looking down. It was a beautiful view and so sad somehow, even if you were in a good mood. He thought again about the way the city was clenched in history’s hand, all the lives knotted together and then left to drift away. There was a little gang of people in his peripheral vision, but it wouldn’t matter what they did.

*

Below, the warren-like streets, the grey buildings. James gulped. It would be over in sixty seconds. Less than that. He looked at the soft light on the letters of the Scotsman building. M-A-N. Dad was waiting. He had the feeling that there was no difference between past and present. He and Dad had always been standing there, and now they would stand together again.

‘Oi!’ said someone, ‘what are you doing? James! What are you doing?’